food lately

This here is a tea egg– apparently a typical Chinese street snack, made by first soft-boiling the egg in water, then cracking the shell a bit, then boiling it longer in tea and soy sauce. There’s an ice cream & crepes shop near my apartment that sells them for 75 cents apiece. This one wasn’t bad, and didn’t have as strong a taste as I might have thought. Cool-looking, huh?

This week I tried adding about a tablespoon of plain yogurt to two scrambled eggs just as they were done, and mixing it all in (I also add plenty of ground pepper and a bit of turmeric to my eggs). Makes for a creamy & tart breakfast, spread on toast. The yogurt we’ve been buying at a nearby Russian market is called “Suzme,” and is incredibly creamy and real tasting.

Lately I have been pureeing vegetables for sauces and soups, then straining them for a smooth consistency. Last week I made a soup this way with a sweet potato, roasted red bell & Anaheim peppers, carrots, onions, scallions, garlic, and some spicy peppers. It was hecka spicy! (sidenote: apparently “hecka” is a regional substitute for “hella” used by polite young’uns in the Bay Area… hilarious, yes?)

So, the soup was spicy and delicious, but not the most exciting thing to eat without some textural solids. So the next day for lunch, I made some gemelli pasta and mixed the soup into that. Made for a great pasta sauce, and I think I may prepare this cold sometime for a picnic pasta salad.

mid-June

I miss the lizards from Florida. No lizards here, at least not until you head further south of the city where it’s warmer. In the Florida summertime, a stroll down the sidewalk becomes a frantic effort not to step on any of the dozens of tiny reptiles running across your path. The dried leaves in the backyard are full of the sound of lizard fights. Oh well, at least I feel more like a lizard in San Francisco, constantly seeking out the sun to raise my core temperature. I do not miss anything else about the Florida summer. That humidity is disgusting.

The other night, we went downtown to a club, and the bus rides to and fro were filled with loud drunken French people, how mystifying. On the ride home, some local lame-o decides to act as cultural ambassador for the city, emphatically insisting that the French students check out Haight Street (”you guys gotta check out Haight… it’s the REAL San Francisco!”).

Now, I will admit that Haight Street is very lively and definitely a part of real San Francisco, but it can get damn sketchy at times (it’s also way commercial). The closer you get to Golden Gate Park on Haight, the more you are inundated with people pushing drugs. Just the other day, some young white kid offered me some “high endorphin hydro,” holding out a pile of loose green in his hand towards me. Come on! Kid, don’t you know how easy it would be for someone to beat the shit outta you and steal your green? Be careful and sensible, people.

Nice cream

It’s been really overcast and/or foggy lately, so yesterday Michelle and I headed west and south to the Mission District in an attempt to find some sunlight (our neighborhood and the western half of San Francisco in general can be foggy when it’s sunny elsewhere). It didn’t work, turned out nobody got to see much of the sun here this weekend.

But we did fit in some thrift-store shopping (found a couple of puppets for cheap) and checked out this ice cream joint, Humphrey Slocumbe. They’ve got a variety of interesting flavors (check their list), and I tried the prosciutto and a Thai-chili-lime sorbet before deciding on a scoop of Balsamic Caramel (which was good and weird) and one of Secret Breakfast (bourbon with cornflakes).

Mmmmm. Real sweet and smooth bourbon flavor, and crunchy cornflakes (I wanted more flakes). It reminded us of our friend Marj’s “special dessert,” which usually consists of ice cream with rum and Kahlua poured on top.

We proceeded to check out a couple of bars, settling at Zeitgeist, where the outdoor area wasn’t too crowded yet. Shared a pitcher of Death & Taxes (I love that beer!) and chatted with a friendly guy at our table.

Pretty exhausted by the time we got home last night. Enjoying a nice at-home Sunday today.

Many friends are coming to visit us in June, I can’t wait!

things have been good…

…but busy. Both Michelle and I have been getting plenty of extra substitute librarian hours at work, and with lengthy commute times, this makes for some tired folks. I swear, lately I get home, eat, and just about fall asleep on the couch immediately afterward.

But this is good. Work = Money, and more importantly (maybe?) Experience and Confidence in your Profession. I’ve particularly been enjoying working in the youth department, helping marble-mouthed kids find the next book in their favorite series or making reader’s advisory recommendations for parents and tutors. While sorting carts of picture books in alphabetical order, I take the time to read a few. I feel like I’m just at the beginning of a process that ends in me being an effective youth librarian, with a good knowledge of authors and works to recommend off the top of my head.

I’ve been riding my bicycle a bit more lately, more than I ever did in Florida (I went years without riding). The key thing for me is the climate difference. In Florida, I would be pouring sweat after 10 minutes. Here, I can bike 45 minutes downtown to pick up a bus that takes me to work, and I am sweating a bit, but it’s so chilly out that my body temp stays within limits that don’t leave me panting and redfaced. It feels great, but some of these San Francisco hills are tough, and I need to work on figuring out bypass routes.

This city is crazy full of great public events, and we’ve been trying to check out as much as we can. Two weekends ago was the How Weird Street Faire, wherein a few downtown blocks are secured, and people party in costumes, dancing to electronic music at any one of 10 stages. Our friend Ashley accompanied us, and we made a nice furry trio:

Sure, there were some sketchy freaks there, including folks who were desperately trying to:

A) get drugs from you,

B) sell you their drugs, or

C) obtain your social validation/sexual participation by dancing practically naked (except for a coating of gold paint) right in your face.

Knowing that San Francisco attracts a lot of New College alums, I have to also remember that some portion of them must be the classic New College Sketchy Alums, as some of the people I saw evoked.

Anyway, it was an awesome event, and dancing on a cool sunny day with a backdrop of tall buildings beats the hell out of dancing in a dark, sweaty club. We should all do this much more often.

This past weekend, our friend Katie visited, and we toured the Haight and the Mission, with obligatory stops at Dolores Park and Zeitgeist’s incredibly crowded “beer garden” (I use this term loosely, having visited real, exponentially more awesome beer gardens in Munich).

Saturday there was an Asian Cultural Festival downtown (Michelle & Katie went, I had to work). Sunday, the annual Bay to Breakers event, a big damn race across the city. While there are still some dedicated people who actually race (or at least travel the full distance- less than 7 miles), for many folks this is another huge street party, and I hear there is some major drunkenness to go along with the floats and costumes. There was a big to-do this year because the police and many residents didn’t want people doing keg stands on floats or pissing in people’s front yards (the bastards!). Ultimately, people still got to do what they wanted (though more Port-a-potties were provided), but I hear the tone was a bit less crazy than recent years. Again, I had to work.

Next weekend there’s a Carnaval parade in the Mission, and Michelle and I get a few days off together (which hasn’t happened in a few weeks).

I hope you are all doing well~

Someone get this lion a tissue…

…before he sneezes and begets a Lion Flu pandemic!

Psycho Patrol

BYOBW

Last Easter Sunday, we rode our bicycles all the way across the city to Potrero Hill, where we and friends attended the Bring Your Own Big Wheels Race. Several years old now, the big event consists of hundreds of people in costume, riding children’s Big Wheels vehicles (and all kinds of other things, like skateboards, trashcans, and coolers) down a super-steep, winding hill.

There were hundreds more folks watching, everyone crowded around various turns in the road, watching with glee as the racers crashed, got run over, or had their wheels shredded.

Totally bitchin’ way to spend an afternoon. What a fun event, what a fun city. After we saw enough of the races, we rode west to Dolores Park in the Mission. It had been oozing people earlier, and was still full but waning. When I returned from going to get a burrito and some beer, an impromptu dance party was going on, reminding me of New College wall parties.

Mission murals- Clarion Alley & otherwise

Clarion Alley (in the Mission District) has a bounty of fantastic mural art. Too bad some lame-o folks just had to tag all over some of them.

Dr. Kitten’s curly whisker

How long will it last for? Will it get any curlier?

San Francisco update

Hello everyone! So much has happened lately, so let’s get started…

At the end of January, Michelle was offered a job as the children’s librarian in Brisbane, CA (a small town just southeast of San Francisco, in San Mateo County). She accepted, with a start date of March 16, and we got to work doing all we needed to do– finishing up work, packing, finding an apartment, etc. The line between excitement and stress blurred, and our longing to see California friends clashed with the sadness of knowing how much we would miss our Florida friends and family.

The day came when Michelle, Dr. Kitten, and I got into our moving truck and hit the road. Taking I-10, we got to our new home in just five days, passing through Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and finally California. Saw some deer, rams, and bats in Texas (a bat hit our windshield at one point). Nice mountains and rock formations, some dust storms. Dr. Kitten was a champ, very well-behaved for a small mammal. (photos here)

Michelle had almost a week to get situated before her new job started– we spent that week unpacking and arranging our new small apartment. Our place is in the Outer Richmond District, on the northwest side of San Francisco, just over a block north of Golden Gate Park. We really like our neighborhood– it’s residential, quiet, and clean. Highly populated by a variety of Asian and Russian residents, and this is reflected in all the restaurants and shops around, where we have a crazy selection of eats– dim sum, sushi, Vietnamese pho, Indonesian, Burmese, Szechuan, Russian bakeries, etc. Regular grocery stores here are way expensive, but great deals on produce can be found at various local markets. I’m finding it surprisingly difficult to only prepare my own food– inexpensive good stuff is all around, and it’s so tempting for a food-lover like me.

So we’ve been here almost a month now, and have done a lot. Public transit is pretty cheap and covers a lot of ground, so it’s not hard to travel. We’ve spent some time in the Mission, looking in thrift stores, eating burritos, and having a picnic in Dolores Park, which becomes packed with people on the weekend. Also spent plenty of time in Golden Gate Park, which amazes me. It’s so vast, and has just about any kind of recreational space you could want– bike trails, exercise equipment, soccer/polo field, tennis, radio-controlled boat lake, fly-fishing casting ponds, big meadows with picnic tables and grills, etc.

This city is just bursting at the seams with events to check out… looking through the two indie/entertainment papers every week, I come across constant concerts that I just have to put out of my head, because I can’t spend $50 on shows every week. Luckily, there’s also plenty of free stuff to do, and exploring the city is entertainment enough.

This week, we are indulging a bit. Monday night we saw one of our favorite musicians, Bonnie Prince Billy, play at the Fillmore. Amazing show in a very classy venue. Tonight we’re going to see one of our favorite comedians, Neil Hamburger. Wednesday (April Fool’s Day), I took part in the St. Stupid’s Day Parade, which involved getting dressed up like an idiot and marching through the downtown financial district, venting anger at irresponsible economic behaviors while banging drums, throwing socks in the air (The Sock Exchange), giving out pink slips, etc. Michelle couldn’t make that one, because she had to work. (photos here)

Speaking of work, that’s going well for both of us. Michelle seems to be settling into her position in Brisbane, which has a tiny library. I started work last week as a substitute librarian in San Mateo County, and was surprised to get more hours than I expected, which really helps out in this expensive city. Thursday was Staff Development Day (a thing libraries do once a year where everyone gets together for talks and such), which was a good chance for us to meet other people in the library system. Everyone is so friendly and laidback, and the organization in general here is very casual, in a way that allows more flexibility in terms of staffing and programming. Just my first impressions…

And now we’re starting to meet some new people… while washing our clothes the other night, we happened upon a laundromat birthday party, and were nicely invited over to join the festivities (cupcakes and a washer full of ice and beer). Turns out everyone there is part of a group that puts on a haunted house event every year, so we may get in touch with them and perhaps do some creative work.

Soooo…. that’s where we are now. It’s a big change for us, and we’re still getting used to it all. While living in the city is fun, it is exhausting, and getting around eats up a lot of time. We miss all of our friends terribly– all our Florida friends who we just left, and our friends elsewhere that we haven’t seen so recently.

That’s all for now, but I plan on posting updates here as often as I can, so check back soon! I’ve got more photos to check out here.